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  • Pastor, will you stick with Donald Trump to the very end? A secular Yuletide homily

    Pastor, will you stick with Donald Trump to the very end? A secular Yuletide homily

    Biodun Jeyifo

     

    Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy Matthew 5:7 (5th of the 8 Beatitudes)

     

    BLESSED are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. This is my favorite of the so-called beatitudes ascribed to Jesus Christ of Nazareth in what has gone down in the Christians’ most holy book as the Sermon on the Mount. It is an entirely coincidental fact that it is on Christmas Day, 2020, that I am writing this piece. I didn’t plan it; my deadline for submitting the article for this penultimate week of the year just happened to fall on Christmas Day. Now, in plain English, the word “beatitude” means blessing, transmuted into the idiom of theological resonance. In order to get a sense of why Jesus of Nazareth placed so great a resonance on mercy, one has to have a knowledge, a sense of the countless generations of past and present people who lived and died without the mercy of their rulers and social superiors – emperors, kings, presidents, governors, landowners, together with their official or populist enablers.

    There is a popular, indeed deliberately produced and propagated image of Jesus of Nazareth as a gentle, peaceable man – “the Prince of Peace”, the sacrificial lamb who gave his life for the redemption of humankind. But the historical, real life Palestinian Jew that became the everlasting Jesus of Christianity was a more complex personality. Yes, he was very sincere, very concerned about the violence that came with mercilessness, so much so that he enjoined his followers to, in the famous words, “turn the other cheek” rather than strike back at their violators and oppressors. But remember, this was the same militant and activist preacher who took the battle to the Pharisees and who scattered the usurers and money-changers from the house of worship with a whip. And indeed, who can deny the historic fact that to most of those to whom he preached, the salvation, the liberation about which he tirelessly and powerfully preached was as much of and in this world as it is in the world to come?

    But what has this to do with Donald Trump and the Pastor in this piece that I describe as a secular yuletide homily? Well, believe it or not, Trump is very popular in Nigeria. As many pundits and polls around the world have clearly shown, Trump’s favorable standing in Nigeria is second to none in Africa and is up there among the highest globally. This is in spite of the fact that Trump has made comments and introduced new US policies targeting Africa and Africans generally and Nigeria and Nigerians in particular. Remember the comment about “shithole countries”? Remember what he said about Buhari in the White House when our president visited Trump not long after his narrow escape from death in his first term as an elected ruler?

    The “Pastor” in this piece is a passionate ideological supporter of the outgoing American president. I briefly exchanged emails with him shortly before and after Trump’s surprising electoral victory in 2015. His fervent support of Trump is part of the deeply disturbing phenomenon of what we might call an often robust expression of “Trumphilia” in Nigeria and Africa. But this is not exactly the case. This is because while virtually all aspects of the admiration for Trump in our country and our continent are deeply problematic, the ideological and theological Trumpism of the Pastor in this piece is worthy of careful consideration in its own right. Indeed, this is the core of this yuletide homily that I shall weave around the ministry of Jesus Christ of Nazareth this Christmas day circa 2020. Thus, it is pertinent for me to briefly recall both the context and the content of my meeting and email exchange with the Pastor.

    As some regular readers of this column may remember, in the runup to the 2015 US presidential elections, in a series that ran for several weeks I had rather confidently predicted that Hillary Clinton would win and Trump would lose. Well, writing from his pastoral base in Ibadan and in very polite but resolutely ideological inflections of language and tone, the Pastor sent me emails challenging both my perspectives and my prediction. Although he was now based at home in Nigeria, he had lived for a long time in the US, he informed me, and was therefore speaking with intimate knowledge of conditions in America. On theological and ideological grounds, the Pastor roundly endorsed the solid support of right-wing American evangelicals for Trump. Like them, he argued that America was being overrun by atheists, communists, socialists and promoters of homosexuality and other godless and sinful lifestyles. Nigeria, Africa and the world should be protected from the sort of society and culture that the Democrats wanted to impose on America. And at any rate, he told me, Trump would win since God was on his side.

    Well, what can I say now? I was so sure of Clinton’s victory that I wrote back to the Pastor to inform him that if Trump won, the next time I was in Ibadan I would make a small donation to his church for the benefit of his congregants. I always meant to redeem that pledge but before I could do so, subsequent events took over completely. This is because as the US midterm elections of 2018 drew near, I wrote another series on Trump regarding the depth of the cruelty, malignity and corruption of his administration. And once again, I predicted that Trump and the Republicans would lose the elections. And as if on cue, all the way from Ibadan came another email from our Pastor, reminding me of how I had lost the wager in 2015, how he was still waiting for me to make good on my pledge.

    And then he himself wagered that the Democrats would lose the 2018 midterm elections as they had done in the 2015 presidential elections – but without telling me what he and his church would forfeit if, as I predicted, the Democrats won. Of course, as we all know, they did and in a landslide too. I have not heard from our Pastor since then, especially now that Trump has lost both the popular and electoral college votes, both of them in landslide victories for Biden.  Dare I hope that if he gets to read this piece the Pastor will contact me again, this time with an answer to the question in the title of this piece?

    In the title of this piece, here is how I put the question: Pastor, will you stick with Donald Trump to the very end? Although I suspect that if he is consistent with the ideological and theological bases of his Trumpism, his answer would be an unequivocal yes, I would leave it to him to speak for himself. In America, 70 million Americans voted for Trump; most, if not all of them, will stick with him to the bitter end, indeed beyond the end itself. Trump has dug deep, deep into the molten core of American and human cruelty and depravity and has taken his millions of supporters with him. But that he has never done with his admirers in Nigeria and Africa and, let us hope, will never do! Long before he gets to the end, most of Trump’s admirers in Nigeria and Africa would have deserted him because they are not racists, they are not fascists and they are not hellbent misanthropes!

    But what of our Pastor? He and others like him have brought God into their cult-like veneration of Donald Trump. Very soon, when Trump might have departed from the White House, the blinding light of his presidential power will no longer be reflected to his followers like godly power. Indeed, the process of stripping Trump of any and all symbolic and discursive vestments of his cult-like identity has already begun. Thus, I repeat my question: Pastor, will you stick with Trump to the very end? If you get to read this and think I am distorting your position, write to me and let me know. I promise to give you some space in this column.

    When hundreds of thousands, indeed tens of millions of Americans this Christmas day pray to God, among other prayers, they will pray for mercy, for this is a terribly, terribly stricken land. Death from the pandemic stalks the land more than it does any other country in the world. Hunger, expressed in endless rows of cars and lines of people waiting all over the country to collect food and groceries, stalks the land. Homelessness, looming or already effective, stalks the land as eviction notices go to millions of Americans unable to meet their rent obligations. And as they pray for mercy this Christmas day, most Americans will remember the fifth beatitude of the Sermon on the Mount: “blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy”. Since most Americans like to think of themselves as merciful, they will feel that they are deserving of God’s mercy. How strange then that most Americans, including his most passionate supporters, would never, never think of asking God to put mercy into the heart of Donald Trump so that his mercy will lift the burden of terrible suffering from their minds and souls since they know that Trump and Mercy are like oil mixed water!

    It is not only the case that most Americans cannot talk of Trump and mercifulness in the same breath, they also know that Trump it is who has also erected immoveable barriers between peoples to prevent them from showing mercy and compassion to one another. Be merciful and you will receive mercy, so says the beatitude. But what happens when there are millions of “others” from whom the millions of your own kind should not expect and therefore should never give mercy and compassion? This is Trump’s America, more riven by explosive polarizations and divisions than at any other time since the American civil war. But concerning American supporters of Trump, especially those of the ideological and theological right, how can they conveniently forget that Jesus Christ of Nazareth built his ministry on loving others as one loves oneself?

    As we saw at the beginning of this piece, the word “beatitude’ means blessing. In this respect, the fifth beatitude on mercy implies that it is a blessing that is both given and received, meaning that it is as much a practice as an unearned gift or benevolence from God. Indeed, on this count, who could be more a practitioner of the fifth beatitude, the blessing of mercy based on praxis, than Christ himself? He not only preached to the multitudes, he fed them. He taught his disciples to cultivate the virtues of selflessness and humility. And he eschewed hankering after wealth and ostentation among his followers. Indeed, what, if not Universal Love, should we make of the magnificent symbolism of the Day of Pentecost when Christ came among the gathered peoples and suddenly, all of them, speaking in their own diverse mother tongues, could completely understand one another?

    No, I have not undergone a reconversion back into Christianity on this Christmas Day of the most perilous and perplexing year of my whole life to date. In other words, this is not an existential “last minute” realignment of secular critical optimism with religious faith. Some of the reasons why Trump is so disturbingly admired in our country and our continent have to do with a regrettable ignorance of the depth of injustice and poverty in America and a naïve and at the same time cynical idealization of America and Americans by many Nigerians and Africans. But the most wrongheaded and dangerous reason is the fact that “Trumphilia” in our country is tied to the deployment of right-wing, evangelical Christian ideology as a faith-based idealization of Trumpism. This is nothing but a veritable absurdity. Trump and the fundamental Christian injunction of mercy for a country and a world desperately in need of mercy? You might as well be riding on a tiger’s back while believing  fatuously that you were inside a horse-drawn carriage.

     

    • Biodun Jeyifo, bjeyifo@fas.harvard.edu

     

  • The stuff that Christmas dreams are made of

    The stuff that Christmas dreams are made of

    Oyinkan Medubi

     

    If the government goes ahead to export electricity when I am in dire need of it at this Christmas time, I tell you, wild horses could not keep me from consulting the Justice Lady and we’ll see which way her sword and scales swing.

    DEAR Reader, last week I moaned to you about ‘Them December blues…’ Well, a kindly gentleman reader gently upbraided me for only groaning on and on about my gloomy preparations for Christmas and not performing up to my usual par. Anyway, I quite understood his peeve. The problem with writing humourous pieces really is that the reader is often hard put to it to distinguish fact from fiction. This week, therefore, the blues ‘are followed by the Christmas of my dreams.’ I think that should heal the breech, sir. Let me tell you out rightly, though, that my dreams are not up to much, if you get my drift.

    My favourite Christmas experience, of course, is shopping. Have you noticed that Christmas is all about shopping, shopping, shopping till you drop? Yes, really, the Christmas experience is all about shopping. This is why every formal and informal businessman, civil trader, transporter, state troopers, me, my dog, etc., I say every one of us runs around like crazy to make that extra bit of money to take care of Christmas demands like food and clothes (for us the children), gifts (for us the missus), special gifts (for us the mistresses) and very special gifts (for us the others). Oh, I am just drooling at the joy of Christmas shopping.

    This year though, the shops are there, but alas, the funds are MIS – (Missing In Action). This means they are not where they should be – you know, in my pocket. They are ‘not on seat’ as we say in Nigeria. No, I am not moaning again; I am just saying. So, finding myself helpless, I determine to at least, ‘look around’. Towns and cities have been built from just looking around. Who knows what may come?

    As I look around, I cannot help but notice that each shop is going out of its way to sell Christmas to me. There are the shelf displays. There are the Christmas lights blinking all the colours of the rainbow. There are the food shelves loaded to the hilt with attractively labelled packs and tins. And oh, there is the music; catchy yuletide tunes that just take me back through the centuries to when Christ was born, though I cannot find him in the shops.

    Have you noticed that Christmas shopping is more about Santa Claus? Seriously, I don’t know who the guy is but he has taken over every shop selling Christmas, even in Nigeria. Listen, now, gifts and food and the special Christmas spirit are not given by people or God but by Santa. They say he is the venerable old man who brings something for the poor and the rich alike. He brings material gifts for the poor and spiritual gifts for the rich because there is a notion that the poor usually lack material comfort and the rich are all dried up spiritually. I don’t know how true that is but I certainly know where I belong in case the … err… Santa is listening. I am firmly seated on the fence. You can’t miss me; just follow everybody’s stones.

    Anyway, my dreams are simple. I am dreaming of a Christmas filled with many gifts from Santa. First, I want him to give me electricity! I think I said this last year. Well, nothing has changed. Man, it is only in Nigeria that electricity is considered a privilege. That is why we have eighteen hours of no-electricity in my neighbourhood (it’s more in some others, I hear); and also why children still hail the company whenever light is restored.

    Seriously, for as long as I remember, Christmas days have been bleak not because it is winter (I wish; at least that would save one from this dust), but because there has been no power to power anything that can make some powerful noise around me. Each year, the duty of NEPA (then) and IBEDC (now) was and has been to greet us with a veil of darkness and silence from its poles. Perhaps, Santa coming from his own poles, can make better noises, such as SWISH, and light up the place, twenty-four-seven. That will be something.

    A propos the matter of light. Last night, I heard a nasty little rumour which I’m praying is not true. I heard that Nigeria was considering selling its excess electricity to other countries. If that is true, then I am hurt and deeply wounded. My wound is so deep I cannot begin to qualify it. How can I be given only six hours of electricity per day while my country sells the stuff to foreign countries? Where is the justice in that, eh? Have I been given the opportunity of first offer for that stuff and I refused it and preferred to stay in darkness? How on earth can anyone do that to me or you or the families that have perished from inhaling generator fumes because there was no electricity? How on earth…?

    I have never taken anyone to court before because most people have not been sufficiently nasty to me to warrant it. However, if the government goes ahead to export electricity when I am in dire need of it at this Christmas time, I tell you, wild horses could not keep me from consulting the Justice Lady and we’ll see which way her sword and scales swing. I tell you, I will not whimper quietly this time.

    This Christmas, I am dreaming of a Nigeria where terrorism (e.g. boko haram), militancy (e.g. Niger Delta), unexplainable killings (e.g. by herdsmen), kidnappings (e.g. Evans’ style as alleged), road blocks (e.g. Nigeria Police), etc., would all cease and we would have some much needed rest and respite from this litany of bad human errors that assault us daily! Haba! Don’t we get tired? Let’s have a different, totally new, totally unexpected and totally pleasant experience this year so that our song will sound like something taken from the TALES PLEASANTE book for children. I told you, my dreams are simple.

    Just one more dream and I’m done. This Christmas, I’m wishing that corruption would not sit down to eat with us. For too many yuletides, it has overshadowed our celebrations, with one scandal or the other breaking out, and has taken over our streets. Just yesterday, I overheard a businessman complain that the young men he hired to handle his rental business have become corrupt. They now have their own clients for whom they use his materials. Imagine his surprise to see his tents at a ceremony he attended and there was no record of the transaction in his ledgers. Things are so bad with us and corruption now that even landlords will soon be tempted to deduct from the rents they collect before they remember the entire money belongs to them. Everyone suffers.

    The stuff that Christmas dreams are made of here are things taken for granted in other countries – sincerity, accountability, kindness, wholesomeness, etc. This is why we have to pray hard for them. It is also why I’m wishing that you will have yourself a very merry time considering all the stress you’ve been through – no light, no food, no sanity, no government even…. Don’t be afraid to get that cow, goat, turkey or chicken and celebrate with it, even if the sellers are behaving like little cows or are goat-headed or are talking turkey or want to chicken out. Just tell them it’s Christmas and it has been a stressful year. Here’s to no more stressful years. MERRY CHRISTMAS!

     

    • Though first published 30/12/18, this article still speaks my mind, largely because my mind has not grown. Happy Christmas!

     

  • Nigeria: When is a failed state?

    Nigeria: When is a failed state?

    Femi Orebe

     

    “A new, slimmed-down state — ideally one with fewer, bankrupt regional assemblies — must concentrate on the basics: security, health, education, power and roads. With those public goods in place, Nigeria’s young people are more than capable of turning the country round. At the present trajectory, the population will double to 400m by 2050. If nothing is done, long before then, Nigeria will become a problem far too big for the world to ignore” – The Financial Times.

     

     

    THERE are times I fear for myself, and it did not start today. Since I began writing for this newspaper, there have been times I believed that the topics I wrote about were inspired.

    This is one such occasion.

    Last Sunday, three whole days before I knew that The Financial Times did an editorial on Nigeria, the above title  so powerfully flashed through my mind that I couldn’t just wish it away. I, therefore,  went to my Face book wall and wrote as follows: “To All You Acadas & The Intelligensia : When is a failed state?.”

    So seriously was this question taken outside there that Mike Omolewa, a highly regarded,  retired University Professor and, former President of UNESCO, ( United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) counted amongst the 46  who have since reacted.

    In answer to the poser, he wrote  “When the State fails to make the minimum requirements of providing equity and quality of welfare for those who installed the governance of the people. Please quote me”. Yo Niyi Adeniyi, however,  a “state can be said to have really failed when the card carrying members of the ruling party start complaining. However, he said further, “this is usually several years after the State had really failed, because the government supporters like you sir, ( me that is), always come to the reality late”.

    I knew it was time for the subject to grace these pages when I, fortuitously, ran into the information that the Financial Times had just done a comment on: ‘Fear of Nigeria Becoming a Failed State’.

    I immediately Googled the piece,

    which am publishing in full because, unlike many articles in foreign publications, even though this contains some home truths about the objective Nigerian condition, it is obvious that the intention is not to ridicule Nigeria or its rulers in front of the world.

    While the piece contains some finger pointing, it is to things Nigerian leaders know only  too well, but would  rather choose to live in denial, preferring like the ostrich, to bury their heads in the sand.

    For instance, should the government of a thoroughly disjointed country like Nigeria, with an unworking, or unworkable structure,  need be told that  it cannot be doing the same things, the same way, and be expecting different results? Should the government need any persuading that restructuring is now a sine qua non, if things would ever change, or should our ruinously inefficient political class be seen running Africa’s biggest economy which they have again ran aground into  recession, a second time  within 5 years, with the coniving National Assembly legislators ranking as about the highest paid parliamentarians on the face of the earth, even as Nigeria is now the poverty capital of the world?

    Not minding these our unforced errors, FT still merely counselled our rulers on the road to go, if Nigeria is to  ever  take its rightful place in the comity of nations. It is hoped that rather than see The Financial Times as a foreign enemy traducing the ‘giant of Africa”, they  should better appreciate a good counsel when they see one.

    The Financial Times Opinion reads as follows:

    “More than 300 Nigerian schoolboys were reunited with their families last weekend, days after they had been abducted by kidnappers from their dormitory in the country’s north-west. The kidnapping revived memories of the 276 Chibok schoolgirls abducted in Borno state in 2014. Just as then, Boko Haram, the militant Islamist group, claimed responsibility.  The government insists no ransom was paid. Scepticism is warranted. In a country going backwards economically, carjacking, kidnapping and banditry are among Nigeria’s rare growth industries. Just as the boys were going home, Nigerian pirates abducted six Ukrainian sailors off the coast.  The definition of a failed state is one where the government is no longer in control. By this yardstick, Africa’s most populous country is teetering on the brink. President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015 pronounced Boko Haram “technically defeated”. That has proved fanciful. Boko Haram has remained an ever-present threat. If the latest kidnapping turns out to be its work, it would mark the spread of the terrorist group from its north-eastern base. Even if the mass abduction was carried out by “ordinary” bandits — as now looks possible — it underlines the fact of chronic criminality and violence. Deadly clashes between herders and settled farmers have spread to most parts of Nigeria. In the oil-rich, but impoverished, Delta region, extortion through the sabotage of pipelines is legendary.  Extortion is a potent symbol for a state whose modus operandi is the extraction of oil revenue from central coffers to pay for a bloated, ruinously inefficient, political elite. Security is not the only area where the state is failing. Nigeria has more poor people, defined as those living on less than $1.90 a day, than any other country, including India. In non-Covid-19 years, one of every five children in the world out of school lives in Nigeria, many of them girls.  The population, already above 200m, is growing at a breakneck 3.2 per cent a year. The economy has stalled since 2015 and real living standards are declining. This year, the economy will shrink 4 per cent after Covid-19 dealt a further blow to oil prices. In any case, as the world turns greener, the elite’s scramble for oil revenue will become a game of diminishing returns. The country desperately needs to put its finances, propped up by foreign borrowing, on a sounder footing.  In its three remaining years, the government of Mr Buhari must seek to draw a line in the sand. It must redouble efforts to get a grip on security. It also needs to restore trust in key institutions, among them the judiciary, the security services and the electoral commission, which will preside over the 2023 elections.  More than that, Nigeria needs a generational shift. The broad coalition that found political expression this year in the EndSARS movement against police brutality provides a shard of optimism. At least Nigeria has a relatively stable democracy. Now Nigeria’s youth — creative, entrepreneurial and less tainted by the politics of extraction — should use that system to reset the country’s narrative. A new, slimmed-down state — ideally one with fewer, bankrupt regional assemblies — must concentrate on the basics: security, health, education, power and roads. With those public goods in place, Nigeria’s young people are more than capable of turning the country round. At the present trajectory, the population will double to 400m by 2050. If nothing is done, long before then, Nigeria will become a problem far too big for the world to ignore”.

     

  • One year and sixty days later

    One year and sixty days later

     Funke Egbemode

     

    I KNEW it was not going to be a walk in the park but I must confess I didn’t know it was going to be this intense. Thirty years in the newsroom toughens you but this, running points on information management of the state is like jogging uphill constantly. Try and imagine that, jogging uphill every day. You know what that does to you? Even if you don’t jog, you can picture how hard that can be. One of the things it does to you is you want the nights to be long so you can postpone the jogging.

    Then you begin to ‘unlike’ the sight of your beautiful red trainers, the sexy jogging pants that leave the guys drooling when you roll pass them. All you wanna do is curl up under the duvet and sleep some more.

    In your dream, ah ah. Maybe in the next life but if you are Commissioner for Information and Civic Orientation in Osun State, you must love jogging uphill, befriend your trainers and learn to ignore those who are panting and drooling after your sexy behind. Seriously.

    It’s been more than one year  since I officially was sworn in into this office. I’m supposed to have relaxed into the job, right? I’m supposed to be used to the hard grind and merciless hours, right? Wrong on both counts, well done.

    I’ll explain!

    First, everyday is production day. Yeah. You are constantly alert, watching out for the darts and bullets. Too many people using your principal as target practice.

    My principal, the governor; he takes it in his strides. He says politics is interesting and that he signed up for service. Good for him. Bad for my shape. Ruins my make-up too.

    I hope he’s not reading this.

    Those using Oyetola as target practice, why are they doing it in the first place? Why have they chosen to go jogging in their dancing shoes?

    First, they didn’t think Mr. Adegboyega Oyetola was going to pose any problem. Osun is broke. He will not be able to pay salaries. He will not be able to clear the backlog of pension arrears. And if he’s struggling with those basics, where will he find funds to do any meaningful projects? So, the bad guys figured, indeed were convinced that Oyetola was going to be easy meat. They figured wrong. They have since discovered that joggers, not dancing shoes were what they needed for this race and round. So, each time they look at the remains of their ruined shoes and bleeding feet, they just grab at anything and hurl at the governor.

    I understand their pain. Poor, poor folks. But my guys (as Prosper would say in the TV comedy series, My Flatmates), you need to calm down, accept that this ain’t the race you will win.

    All your permutations are destined to miss the mark. Oyetola is determined to make his mark, regardless of every distraction.

    How did Governor Oyetola pull the rug from under those who thought he’d not be able to deliver? He ended the season of unpaid or half-paid salaries. The people who run the machinery of government deserve their wages. He consistently pays the backlog of retirement benefits. He implemented the payment of 100% CONMESS (for doctors) and CONHESS (for other health workers). He topped that with the implementation of the new minimum wage, lifted the ban on promotions. Now, workers, active and retired, are happy and praying for him.

    To think that election campaigns in these parts for a while had been about unpaid and half-paid wages, what are ‘my guys’ going to do now?

    Oh, the projects executed, being executed and about to be commissioned are in dozens. Commissioners and heads of agencies are kept on their toes to deliver, all of us. So, every sector has been touched. The empowerment programs excite me. The joy on the faces of the members of Old Students Associations whose schools got their grooves back is awesome. The Primary Health Care Centers have been retrieved from the Snowball, Napoleon and Old Major of Animal Kingdom. From agric to commerce, transport and works to security, things are looking up and there is hope Osun will be better than Oyetola met it.

    But I must confess, the experience has been awesome. Wait, that does not mean I like all of them. Yes, I like the traditional drummers because I naturally like to dance. So when I step out of my car and the drummers swoop on me, I let go. They cheer me up and in any case, I have to part with some money, so I might as well get value for my investment, right? They drum; I dance a little and pay a little. Sometimes that happens four times in one day. Didn’t I tell you, this job is not a sit-in-your-office-and-drink-coffee job? You are all over the place. I report, I write, I come up with story ideas, I proof read and do all the attached politics.

    My biggest lesson though is, there are still good men among our leaders. Not all of them are selfish and self- centered. The day Governor Adegboyega Oyetola said to me: “Funke, I don’t want you responding to all those distractors on social media. I want to only see reports about what government is doing. I don’t want any distraction. Just promote and publicise what I’m doing. No embellishment. Strictly what you can defend.”

    My jaw dropped. I quickly picked it before it landed on the floor. Wow, is this governor a politician? Is he one of us? That was in January 2020. I swallowed hard and told myself he’d soon change. Is he not a governor, a Nigerian politician, baked in our political oven? He’d soon know ’whatsup’ and wise up. But Oyetola is still the same old kind, level-headed, warm, soft-spoken, measured leader. Not even the attack on his life in October changed him. Not the looting, not Endsars. Sure-footed daddy of all. He wouldn’t even let anybody be ‘convicted’ for flouting Covid-19 protocols. ‘Go and rev up the enlightenment, Funke. Yes, let them sit by the roadside. But don’t turn anybody into an ex-convict. They’ll need to fill forms, travel out of the country when all this blows over. Let’s look beyond today.”

    I’ve learnt how to be calm in the face of extreme provocation. The foolish girl that broke the windscreen of the vehicle I was in the day the governor was attacked would not have gone scot-free if I wasn’t copying Mr. Oyetola. Even my closest family are shocked at how I’ve handled that.

    After all the shots, axes and cutlasses attack, all Mr. Oyetola had to say to me is: ‘set the records straight. I don’t want their lies to gain traction. Let’s do the decent thing.” Ah, I wanted to fight o; I must confess, because those goons almost made my children orphans that day. But I have calmly reported them to God and the host of heaven. It was not easy to be calm considering many things. Hmmmm. But this governor teaches you daily not just by what he says, how he says it, but also what he does. Like I told him, I’m ‘prouding’ because he has shown that you can be a politician and still be a good man, that you can love the people you govern even when your life is threatened. He has made my job easy too. It’s been one year and sixty days of very long hours but this apprentice politician from the newsroom is learning fast.

     

    • Egbemode is Commissioner for Information and Civic Orientation in Osun State

     

     

  • Beyond hostage rescue

    Beyond hostage rescue

    Comment

     

    ON December 17, 344 pupils of Government Science Secondary School (GSSS) in Kankara, Katsina State, were recovered after seven days in the den of abductors who attacked their school on  December 11 under the cover of darkness and corralled the schoolboys into the forest. The recovery was widely hailed – rightly so – for avoiding making any of the kidnapped schoolboys a collateral casualty. The military said that feat was achieved by sheer professionalism of its troops in Operation Hadarin Daji, who rescued the boys after being availed of credible intelligence. But Zamfara State Governor Bello Matawalle, corroborated by Katsina State Governor Aminu Masari as well as information and culture minister Lai Mohammed, said the boys were released following backchannel negotiations with the abductors facilitated by the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN), and repentant bandits. Note: Not that those narratives were fundamentally contradictory; only a difference of emphasis perhaps, since it was reported that both ‘kinetic’ and ‘non-kinetic’ approaches were applied.

    Barely 48 hours after the Kankara pupils regained freedom, gunmen ambushed no fewer than 80 Islamiyya school students, mostly girls, in Dandume council area of same Katsina State. Dandume is about 64 kilometers from Kankara. The bandits had already abducted four people and stolen a dozen cows when they ran into the schoolchildren who were on their way home from Maulud annual celebration in the village of Mahuta. The kidnap attempt was however foiled by security operatives who rescued all the Islamiyya students as well as the four others earlier abducted after a gunfight with the bandits. It was a feat for which the military and the police separately claimed credit. “The team (of policemen and a community self-defence group) succeeded in dislodging the bandits and rescued all the 84 kidnapped victims and recovered all the 12 rustled cows,” Katsina State police spokesman Gambo Isa said in a statement, adding: “Search parties are still combing the area with a view to arrest(ing) the injured bandits and/or recover their dead bodies.”

    Rather than chest beating by security operatives, however, we think immediate attention should be on rehabilitating the young victims of these abductions. The Kankara boys, for instance, recounted experiences of physical abuse, mental torture and psychological trauma, among others, while under the hold of kidnappers. Following their release, the pupils had looked unkempt and wearied when they arrived in Katsina penultimate Friday. They were reported saying while being rustled off by the kidnappers; those who could not keep pace in the bush were flogged, not to mention that they were sustained on a rationed supply of cooked cassava and potatoes. “Right now, I am not feeling well, and it is because of the terrible experience I had. The people (bandits) forced us to walk throughout. They flogged those who were not keeping up with others. We were fed Dankali (potatoes) and cassava and we were not fed every day. But some of us were able to get some fruits that we also ate,” one of the pupils was reported saying.

    Indicating the psychological trauma was an account by another pupil who was quoted saying: “The bandits kept shooting in the air to scare us, and they warned us against making any attempt to escape.  They gave us food when they felt like and gave us dirty water to drink. This made some of us to fall sick, but they were able to recover without being attended to. As I’m talking to you, I’m not feeling well. I want to go home.”

    It is noteworthy that many of these schoolboys are pre-teens and teenagers. Hence, even though they were accorded medical examination on the heels of their release / rescue, much more needs be done by way of concerted programme of psychological healing and social comfort before they are sent back to the classrooms. This is a responsibility that falls on both the federal and Katsina State governments.

    Besides, even though government insisted that no ransom was paid to secure freedom for the schoolboys; indications are that it is far from getting a handle on the porous security situation in the country. About the same time that the Kankara pupils were released, gunmen attacked the convoy of Emir of Kaura Namoda, Zamfara State, Alhaji Sanusi Muhammad, killing eight people and injuring others. The emir’s convoy was ambushed on Zaria-Funtua highway penultimate Saturday while returning to Gusau from Abuja;, he however escaped unhurt. And last weekend in Borno State, no fewer than 35 travellers were abducted by terrorists on the Maiduguri-Damaturu highway, prompting Borno State Governor Babagana Zulum to accuse the military of having failed the people. “If the army cannot protect people travelling within a distance of only 20 kilometres, then I cannot foresee the capacity of the army ending this insurgency any time soon,” he said.

    We consider it curious that security agencies jostle for credit over isolated remediation of security breaches that should never have happened in the first place. Such disposition, we think, implies a surrender to perceived inevitability of those breaches. Rather, there should be a concerted drive to prevent breaches occurring and ensure all-time safety of citizens, which should be the primary responsibility of government.

  • On another year of this column’s complaints 

    On another year of this column’s complaints 

    Ropo Sekoni

     

    THIS is the season to formalize appreciation of readers of this querulous column about the architecture and culture of governance of our country. As an incurable federalist, I note with gratitude the thickness of the skins of readers of this column that has made them stick to the page, despite periodic drabness of the themes that characteristically dominate this page. Allow me to take cover under the proverb that says: For as long as there are lies on the head, there will always be blood on the fingers of people allergic to such vermin.

    As the page periodically acknowledges, the preoccupation with themes of re-federalization germinated during the NADECO struggle for restoration of democracy in the country after the annulment of the 1993 presidential election. Even in 2020, the mind behind this column believes that only one of the two projects of NADECO, restoration of democracy or de-militarization of the polity, has been achieved. The second goal of restoring federalism, alias, restructuring, has not been seen clearly enough as a problem that yearns for solution. This explains why, like in previous years, the themes on this page in 2020 are still largely about the architecture of governance and culture of governance, apart from few articles on the coronavirus pandemic.

    Most articles on this page addressed during the year the imperative of re-federalizing the country in respect to many aspects of governance. A few articles that referred to the constitution made a few assumptions. One is that the departing military government in 1999 sought to find ways to perpetuate the military’s narrow vision of what Nigeria should be—unitary in governance and uniform in culture, despite glib references by political leaders to the value of unity in diversity. By delaying the unearthing of the constitution till after the 1999 presidential election, the military sole authors of the constitution schemed to turn the constitution into a permanent Union Charter, regardless of the views of citizens. And such wish seems to have come true even after two decades of post-military governance.

    Consequently, despite late Biodun Oki’s challenge of the integrity of the constitution in court, members of the political class of all persuasions that were preoccupied with political power encouraged each other that the constitution is not a problem as much as the people who operate the document and urged advocates for restructuring and a people’s constitution  to get used to what is on the ground and take advantage of the for amendments, ignoring the insurmountable obstacles erected in the constitution for  radical amendments. One or two articles during the year reminded fellow citizens that the 1999 Constitution is due for replacement, because it remains a constitutionalizing of the vision of military dictators, rather than of the kind of Nigeria the people would prefer.

    During the outgoing year, this column also challenged attempts to promote a culture of acceptance of unrealistic attitude to the country’s ethnic and cultural plurality, especially attempts by political commenters about the root cause of the underperformance of Nigeria in the last 50 years. This page disagreed with facile theories about etiology of Nigeria’s problems as the failure of citizens to move beyond their ethnic origins and consciousness to a supra-ethnic one. Such explanation promotes a lazy attitude to the country’s reality and promotes an escapist view. Opting for self-erasure—whether you are Yoruba, Igbo, Ijaw, Hausa, etc., is more likely to create cultural rootlessness that can rob the country of the advantages that its diversity can bring to the entire country. Locating the problem of unitary governance of a multiethnic federation in the citizens’ unreadiness to acquire a new psychology and personality is puerile, unrealistic, and a ploy by those benefiting from the current architecture of governance to create more possibilities for those who see building a multinational state with the tools of geopolitical manipulations to create a huge empire for one of the ethnic groups, rather than a harmonious federation.

    In addition, the column in 2020 had a few pieces on the imperative of multilevel policing as superior to the mono-level police system favored by the 1999 Constitution and preferred by the current federal government. The current Nigeria Police Force and its new efforts to subsume a rare form of community policing methods under its control was argued as unsuitable for a democratic multinational state. Policing and other forms of security are about people in specific communities and the more culturally diverse such communities are, the more the police system should be designed to make people with cultural sensitivity to and familiarity with specific communities a preferred model. If anything, the recent abduction of 344 students in Kankara may increase the debate on imperative of state and local government policing in 2021.

    The year presented two articles on grazing and Ruga. The articles responded to calls for reviving colonial grazing routes to enable cattle farmers take their cattle across the country, by criticizing such calls as obsessing over a primitive method of animal farming that the country should do everything possible to outgrow. Further, the pages on animal grazing and Ruga settlements argued that all human groups started with gathering and hunting and later evolved to domestication of animals that at the beginning of cattle farming involved various degrees of nomadism. But most human groups also evolved further to ranching and that Nigeria should not glorify ancient ways of cattle farming when other societies are raising cattle through the ranch model. I also pointed at the threat to security if nomadic herdsmen from neighbouring countries need to enter Nigeria without proper documentation to graze their cattle while also agreeing with development of Ruga in states that produce cattle as an effective way to transform nomadic cattle farmers into sedentary modern cattle farmers.

    On the government’s Water Bill, the column argued that centralization of water is another move toward further unitarization of the country, arguing that the government should learn from other countries, such as Israel, India, United Arab Emirates on various ways of responding to forms of water shortage in any part of the country.   The column pointed out that centralization of water management is likely to go the way of centralization of production and management of electricity in the past, urging the federal government to follow the science of fighting water shortage wherever the threat occurs, rather than creating policies that can cause inter-state tension, citing provision in the bill for federal government’s management of banks of rivers within specific states as a recipe for crisis between herdsmen and farmers.

    In an article on getting ready for the new normal after the 2020 pandemic, the page called on the federal government to use the loss of income from fossil fuel as a warning about what is to come, as many nations continue to opt to pay more attention to the environment by moving away from the carbon economy. Citing the emphasis of the Buhari government on diversification of the economy as a good beginning to respond to the new normal, the column suggested that sincere plans to depart from the country’s carbon economy requires a return to federalist governance, arguing that petroleum was a major factor in the de-federalizing of the country during the decades of military rule. Nigeria had a diversified economy before the federal military government took over management of the petroleum sector. Agriculture was the mainstay of the economy in the four federating units and now that agriculture is coming back to drive the economy and agriculture remains a land-specific project, a bloated federal ministry of agriculture with two ministers from one region is not the answer to fruitful diversification through agriculture.

    The column also expressed surprise that the federal government got into building structures to discourage open defecation and screamed that this should be a local government matter as nothing can be more local than defecation. And about Almajiri and education, the column observed that the game changer for all human beings at present is education and that the governments across the country have said enough good things about education and should now use resources to establish and sustain public education that can enhance the nation’s competitiveness within or outside the space of globalization.

  • Police parade four suspected IPOB members

    Police parade four suspected IPOB members

    By Rosemary Nwisi, Port Harcourt

    Rivers State Police Commissioner (CP) Joseph Mukan on Thursday paraded four persons suspected to be members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).

    He also paraded two kidnappers, who allegedly abducted an official of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) at his home in Ada-George, Obio Akpor Local Government, last week.

    The suspects: Ugochukwu Abaziem, Chinedu Ureabu, Sunny Vincent and Onyekachi Sylvester (IPOB members); and Godspower Saturday and David Simeon were paraded for alleged kidnapping.

    The CP said the suspected Biafra agitators were arrested at Iriebe, Obio/Akpor, near Oyibo.

    Read Also: No plan to forcefully declare Biafra, says IPOB

    Mukan alleged that the men were part of those who hijacked EndSARS protest in the state, unleashed mayhem on security men and burnt down their stations.

    But the suspects denied involvement in IPOB agitation.

    They said they were not involved in the torching of police stations.

    “We were framed up,” the suspects alleged.

    One of them, Vincent, said the police arrested him while he was doing early morning walk/jogging.

    The police commissioner has assured residents of a hitch-free Yuletide, but warned against the use of fireworks and crackers. He urged parents and guardians to warn their children and wards against the use of fireworks during the festivities.

  • Buhari approves redeployment of nine Perm Secs

    Buhari approves redeployment of nine Perm Secs

    Our Reporter

    President Muhammadu Buhari has approved the redeployment of nine Permanent Secretaries in the Federal Civil Service.

    Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (HOCSF), Dr. Folasade Yemi-Esan, announced this yesterday in Abuja in a circular.

    The permanent secretaries are: Mr. Musa Istifanus, from Ministry of Communication and Digital Economy to Ministry of Defence and Mr. Gabriel Aduda, from Ministry of Youths and Sports Development to Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

    Others are: Mr. Ernest Umakhihe, from Works and Housing to Agriculture and Rural Development; and Mr. Festus Daudu, from the Office of HOCSF to Communication and Digital Economy.

    Read Also: Buhari’s ‘warrant chiefs’

    Mr. Nebosila Anako was moved from Information and Culture to Youths and Sports Development, while Mr. Babangla Hussaini moved from Defence to Works and Housing.

    Similarly, Dr. Anthonia Ekpa was redeployed from Office of the HOCS to Ministry of Women Affairs, while Dr. Adaora Anyanwutaku moved from Women Affairs to Information and Culture.

    Also, Mr. James Sule was redeployed from the Office of the HOCSF to Cabinet Affairs Office at the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (OSGF).

    According to the statement, the redeployment takes immediate effect.

  • More combat aircraft coming

    More combat aircraft coming

    Our Reporter

    Chief of Air Staff Air (CAS), Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar, has said the Nigeria Air Force (NAF) will receive a new A-29 Super Tucano fighter aircraft in 2021 to strengthen the nation’s defence.

    Abubakar said this during the inauguration of officers’ accommodation and a 1.3-kilometre road at NAF Base in Kainji, Niger State.

    “Sometime ago, I was here to commission one of the three Alpha Jet aircraft programmed for Periodic Depot Maintenance and the rehabilitated 2.8-kilometre road infrastructure in this base.

    “I am highly delighted to be here again today for the inauguration of another set of projects. “This is in fulfilment of my earlier promise that additional projects would be undertaken to enhance your competence,” he said.

    Read Also: Cancer: Air Force treats 2,250 Osun residents

    The CAS explained that the provision of additional infrastructure at the base was to appreciate the effort and contribution of the personnel of 407 Air Combat Training Group in projecting air power across the country.

    “I thought it necessary that they have a befitting environment to further motivate them towards better output in their endeavour.

    “The projects being commissioned today are part of our efforts towards ensuring a befitting environment and better living conditions in Kainji base.

    “These accommodations among others which were earlier commissioned and some ongoing ones will ensure that personnel of the unit have an environment conducive to retire to on completion of the day’s work.

  • ‘Air Force got 23 fighter jets in five years’

    ‘Air Force got 23 fighter jets in five years’

    By AbdulGafar Alabelewe, Kaduna

    President Muhammadu Buhari has said his administration got 23 brand new aircraft for the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) to boost its fight against insecurity in the last five years.

    President Buhari spoke on Thursday at the induction and commissioning of newly acquired NAF MI-171E helicopter and two reactivated Alpha jets and one L39ZA aircraft in Kaduna.

    The President, who commissioned the aircraft virtually, said his administration would continue to support the Air Force and the entire Armed Forces to enable them become more effective in the execution of their mandate for the safety and security of Nigeria and Nigerians.

    He said: “Today’s induction brings to 23 the number of brand new aircraft that have been added to the inventory of the Nigerian Air Force since we came on board in 2015 and is a clear reflection of our unflinching commitment to ensuring the security of Nigeria and Nigerians.

    “These 23 new aircraft are aside the 15 additional aircraft, including 12 Super Tucano aircraft from the United States of America and three JF-17 Thunder Multi-Role fighter aircraft from Pakistan that have been procured and will soon be delivered.”

    President Buhari said these achievements are aside the support towards reactivating over 25 erstwhile unserviceable aircraft “significantly boosting the capacity of the NAF to deliver robust air power in support of our counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency efforts”.

    Read Also: Police nab fake Air Force Captain in Katsina

    The President said he had released two Agusta 101 helicopters from the Presidential Air Fleet to the NAF to improve its tactical capability.

    He reiterated the promise of his administration to remain committed to confronting the Boko Haram insurgency as well as other forms of criminality that have bedevilled the country.

    President Buhari hailed the security forces for the successes they have recorded so far, especially by restoring “some level of stability not only in Borno and Yobe states but also in Adamawa State.

    “Consequently, I want to sincerely thank Nigerians for believing in us and coming together as a nation, irrespective of political, religious and ethnic affiliations, to bring this scourge to an end,” he said.

    President Buhari acknowledged the critical role the NAF has been playing in national and continental security and peace-keeping operations since its establishment in 1964.

    “Her contributions in internal security, peace-keeping and humanitarian operations in places like The Gambia, Guinea Conakry, Mozambique, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Mali, Guinea Bissau and Cameroon have not only been a source of pride to us as a nation but has also projected us as a reliable regional power that has helped to stabilise other nations and stood firm in defence of democracy,” he added.